Credit

Caption

Circinus Galaxy (ESO 97-G13), infrared image. This galaxy is around 14 million light years from Earth, in the constellation of Circinus. Normally obscured by dust, viewing it in infrared reveals additional details. It is an example of a Seyfert galaxy, and consists of a central core (yellow) and extended spiral arms (green). The core consists of a ring of star formation around a supermassive black hole forming an active galactic nucleus (AGN). The colours represent infrared light from stars (blue) and from the gas and dust of nebulae (red and green). This image, published in 2011, was obtained by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE).